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Video Games Seen becoming a new Frontier in Digital Rights

Article content By Avi Asher-Schapiro



NEW YORK, July 30 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Digital rights battles that are crucial to privacy as well as free speech and anonymity are being fought more often in video games, a booming market that is becoming an "new political arena," experts and insiders told the Reuters Foundation on Thursday.



Video games are seen as an exciting new frontier in digital rights.



Participants at RightsCon an event on digital rights, said that the industry is expected to increase its revenue to $300 billion by 2025. This makes it more urgent to ask what designers, operators and governments tackle sensitive issues.
Minecraft list


Article content



Article content In the last few months, a Hong Kong activist staged a protest against Beijing's rule inside a popular social simulator game called Animal Crossing, and a member of the U.S. Congress, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, campaigned in the game as well.



The game Minecraft has been used to circumvent censorship, with groups using it to build digital libraries and smuggle banned texts into countries that are oppressive.



Micaela Mantegna founder of GeekyLegal (an Argentinian group that is focused on technology policy) she said, "Video games are now this new arena of political discussion."



Additionally, game designers have been tackling sensitive topics by designing games that address issues like refugees or mental illness.



"Video games are a great way to start talking about topics that are difficult to discuss in real life," said Stephanie Zucarelli who is a board member for Women in Games Argentina, a non-profit group.



Content of the article User rights could be violated, according to Kurt Opsah (an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation), an organization for digital rights.



Law enforcement can ask game companies for their personal information about users operating companies are able to restrict game players and governments can pressure game operators and makers to take down the content, he said.



He gave an example of the U.S. military deleting critical remarks that were posted on recruitment channels hosted on Twitch, a popular streaming platform.



"They did not want people to be anti-military on their recruiting channels," he said.



Governments can exert pressure on video game companies, he said such as in the case of Activision Blizzard Entertainment that last year removed a player from a video game contest because of political remarks regarding Hong Kong in an interview.



Tencent Holdings, a Chinese gaming giant, partly owns Blizzard.



(Reporting by Avi Asher-Schapiro. Editing by Ellen Wulfhorst. Thomson Reuters Foundation, Thomson Reuters' charitable arm is to be acknowledged. It is a source of information about the lives and struggles of people all over the world who cannot live free or fairly. Visit http://news.trust.org)


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